jmallett :: Concerning the requirements of an sysadmin,the situation is the same in Hongkong.
Flipping the Recruit,you can find that almost all computer-related jobs,namely:
Junior Programmer Network Operator

Newtork Admin

Unix/Linux Admin

They all require a CS degree.
I think there are 2 reasons:

Excessive production of CS students

There are many CS students produced each yrs from 7 universities.A CS degree seems to be the minimum requirement to get a computer-related job.As the supply is greater than demand,why don't those employers employ more CS guys?
As they are at least professionally trained and quite cheap in term of salary.Fresh CS graduates here are pulling USD 1200-USD 2000 /mo only

Misunderstanding of job requirement from the HR dept of that company

Those HR dept people studied HR only.How the hell can they spot the differences between network admin and programming?
How can they know a CS student never study admin of an OS in university?
What they know is simple:If i need a computer guru,grab me a CS student,isn't it the Title "Computer Science: clear enough for them?

To recap,even a CS graduate is facing difficulty to find a job this yr,so what do you think?

Based on your impressive experience,i think you should grab a M.Sc in CS,so that you may face less difficulty.

I am now developing a website for linux.org.hk tech team for them to communicate and hack together.As if you may read my diary entries,you may know i seldom hack softwares to contribute to the community.

What i do most is to give introduction of those COOL software like PHP to newbies,in form of printed articles and online articles.

I also maintain a couple of mirrors like GNU,LDP,CLDP,Webmin and LinuxFocus in my collocation server for speedy access of newbies in my country.